PeteSamMemories

Memories of daily life with Pete (born Aug 2000) and Sam (born Dec 2003)

Saturday, July 25, 2015

Slice Maneuver

Pete and Sam played some golf with Dad today at Sterling Park.

After finishing his Saturday morning run with Brian on the Ashburn Fit Trail, Dad headed off with Pete for their 11:20am tee time. They played 9 holes and then met Mom and Sam on the picnic tables for lunch. Dad swapped out Pete and Sam's bags on the pull cart, and headed out with Sam to play the back 9.

Dad very nearly got a hole in one on #13. When they got up to the green, Dad's ball mark was about 2 inches from the hole, and the ball rolled about 3-4 feet by.

Pete started off with a really nice tee shot on hole #1 - pin high and just a bit to the right of the green. He also finished off with a great six-foot putt on #9 - dead center. In between, he had several shots that he called "disasters" (but they weren't that bad). Sam had quite a few good shots using his chipping technique that he has dubbed the "Slice Maneuver". He also had several two-putts, and mostly three-putts on the other holes. And he nearly met his goal of chipping in - on #11, he hit a 30-foot chip that came just short of rolling in.

It was a fun day at the course for all.

That evening, Dad helped Pete work on some of the exercises for his Drivers Ed / Health class that he is taking over the summer. Then he went out for the rest of the night with Chandler, not seen again until late the next day.

Wednesday, July 22, 2015

The End of Oversight

Today is officially the 10th anniversary of this blog.

Yep, exactly 10 years and 1,383 posts ago this blog was started on 7/22/05.

Pete and Sam have come a long way in these 10 years. When the blog started, Sam was 19 months old. Today he decided to order a ukulele, a transaction which consisted of: giving Pete $55 cash, and Pete ordering it on his credit card, with 2-day shipping from Amazon Prime that he had signed up for on his own account.

Mom and Dad were out of the house while all of this transpired. Dad was at a Willowwacks concert, and Mom was at One Loudoun with her friend, listening to some outdoor live music. Dad learned of the ukulele purchase around midnight, when Sam casually mentioned: "by the way, I bought a ukulele and it is coming on Friday".

Sunday, July 12, 2015

Building Museum

Mom, Dad, and Sam went to see "The Beach" exhibit at the National Building Museum.

They met Maddox, Rider, and Katie at the Wiehle Metro station and took the new Silver line to the museum. After riding up an escalator that sounded like a saxophone busker, they made their way into the museum to be greeted by the 2 hour line.

Dad took Maddox and Sam to Subway for some lunch (and then McDonald's when Subway was closed). Then they played (and sword-fighted) for a while in the Work Build Play exhibit.

Friday, July 10, 2015

Mini-Vacation Wrap-up

The "staycation" idea got off to a good start with the trip to Six Flags that everyone seemed to enjoy. But the remainder of the family vacation did not go as well. Mom and Dad had a list of about 20 activities to do, but Pete and Sam were more interseted in relaxing at home. Each day they convinced Sam to almost go to the Symington water park at Ida Lee.

Mom and Dad took advantage of the time anyhow to go out to lunch a few times and do a Scavenger Hunt in the Broadlands. They eventually got stuck on the following clue:

Here are the unused activities that they have saved up for a future vacation:

Thursday, July 09, 2015

Mini-vacation Day 3

The original plan on this hot sumer day was to go to the A. V. Symington water park, but the boys were too worn out from Six Flags. So Mom and Dad went to lunch and brought home Subway. Then Dad announced that at 6:30 they would be going to play mini-golf and then dinner.

It was a spirited game of mini-golf. Mom won the hole-in-one contest by scoring one early on in the match. There was also a family 2 streak going until one of the latter holes (at least one person gets a 2 on the hole). Other than Pete refusing to accept some of Sam's score calculations, a fun time was had by all.

On the way home, they stopped at Pomodoro's for dinner and a Deluxe Cookie Sandwich. (And an unfortunately soupy McFlurry for Pete after Menchies closed 30 minutes before their posted closing time.)

Wednesday, July 08, 2015

Mini-Vacation Day 2

Day 2 of the mini-vacation started with a quick breakfast at the Holiday Inn. Everyone piled in to the car for the 10 minute drive to Six Flags America, and they arrived at the gate just around 10:00. Unfortunately, it turns out that the park didn't open until 10:30.

Once inside, they rode all of the rides on Dad's list with plenty of time to spare. There were no lines for anything all day. Here are Mom, Pete, and Sam on the Voodoo Drop in the Mardi Gras area:

The boys came up with their own names for each ride. Sam called the Wild One "The Cheese Machine". Dad called is "Blind Curve Frenzy". Dad called Joker's Jinx "Uvula" and Sam called it "Ball Twister". Here are Dad and Sam after riding Superman (aka "Blackout"):

Dad had some fun in the gift shop while waiting for everyone to ride Superman the second time:

Take back what you said about chubby mini Wonder Woman keychain!

The trip to the Hurricane Harbor water park area in the afternoon did not go as well. Before the waves even started in the wave pool, "someone" thought they saw some lightning and closed everything down. After a brief family workout at the poolside, everyone agreed to get changed and head home.

On the way out of the park, Pete wanted to try one of the basketball games. This turned out to be rather amusing. As the guy was reviewing the rules, everyone spotted a little kid underneath the booth stealing some of the prizes! Dad and Pete interrupted the guy: "that little dude is stealing your prizes!" And they all ran around the back and chased him off. Pete made shots #1 and #2 for a medium prize, with which he selected the rainbow ball pictured below:

Sam also tried the ladder climb earlier, when Dad convinced the attendant to let him do it for $1. And he got a free shot at the basketball game, as thanks for helping the booth attendant nab the little thief and recover his stolen prizes.

Tuesday, July 07, 2015

Mini-Vacation Day 1

Pete was unexpectedly off from work this week. So after Dad's conference call and Mom's work session on Tuesday, it was time to start the mini-vacation.

The trip began with dinner at Pizza Hut over by Dad's office. Dad brought some pencil and paper to discuss some network diagrams, but (don't ask) they ended up playing a game where you go around the table and each person names something upstairs in the house. If you name something that there is more than one of, you say the number and someone else can challenge. For example, you can say "12 doors" and someone can challenge and say that there are actually 13. The food came before they got to move on to the main level of the house or the basement.

Next Mom and Pete got to see Dad's office. Pete left a nice surprise for everyone on the white board in the training room:

At the Holiday Inn, there was a cool ice cream machine. So the boys grabbed a late night snack. Sam also created a nice comfy bed using some chairs in the room:

Friday, July 03, 2015

Paycheck

Congratulations to Pete on receiving his first paycheck on Friday!

He was a bit disappointed to see all of the withholdings - Medicare, Social Security, Federal Tax, and State Tax. He'll definitely need to file to get those last two refunded at the end of the year. We'll have to follow the election next year and see which candidates support lower taxes.

Even with the withholdings, it was a pretty good haul. It helped that he had 7.25 hours of overtime - paid at time and a half!

Saturday, June 27, 2015

Grandma and Grandpa

Mel and Sandy came for a visit on the last weekend in June. This was a good opportunity to celebrate Mom's birthday. Grandma brought her usual assortment of "gifts". This means a shirt for Dad, pajamas for Mom, and some kids' books for Pete and Sam.

They couldn't get a room at the Hampton in Dulles, so they ended up in Chantilly this time. They arrived on Saturday evening, in time for some Chinese food and cake for Mom (that Dad and Pete picked up from Dairy Queen).

On Sunday, Dad and Grandpa played some par 3 golf while the others went to see the movie "Inside Out". Then they all went to dinner at Red Robin.

While waiting for their table, Dad and Sam walked to look for a geocache. They spotted the following sign, which did not seem to be in the best location:

Wednesday, June 24, 2015

Junior Counselor

Technically one needs to be age 15 to apply as a paid Junior Counselor at American Inline. But with Pete's experience from last year, the Director agreed to give him a shot. So he will be working for most of the summer.

Unfortunately, his first week was all the way out in McLean, and Mom had signed up for a curriculum symposium, so Dad dropped off Pete at camp each morning at 7:15am and then went to his office in Reston until it was time to pick Pete up at 4:45pm.

Pete was always the first one there in the morning and the last one to leave at the end of the day. Which is good, since he discovered that he makes time and a half for his overtime hours.

Pete received a special letter of commendation from the Director. In the past, he had taught the skateboarding and inline skating classes. But this time he agreed to teach biking classes, even though that was not his preference. He also worked very patiently with a challenging group of kids who did not know how to ride at all.

Famous Dave's

It's High School graduation week for cousin Sarah, which means time for a 4-day pilgrimage down to Virginia Beach.

Sam left on Wednesday morning to drive down with Nana, Poppy, and Shadow. After a few donuts, they hit the road at 8:30am.

Mom, Dad, and Pete headed out in the evening. It did not take more than a few minutes for the first great tragedy to occur, which was Pete dropping the USB connector for his mouse between the seats of Mom's CR-V. (It was not ultimately recovered until hours later.) So Pete had to suffer with Mom's mouse in order to contunue working on his arrangement of "Come Sail Away" on his laptop.

Dad had planned for dinner at Shane's Rib Shack in Fredericksburg, but upon arrival Pete decided that it was fast food and he wanted to go to a restaurant. So they headed a bit further to Famous Dave's.

Pete was kind enough to take a picture of a hungry Mom and Dad while they were waiting for their food.

Ultimately, they arrived in Virginia Beach around 11:30pm, with enough time to get a quick tour of Aunt Stacy and Eddie's new house and put Sam to bed.

Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Sam 5th grade Carnival

Sam had his last day at Dominion Trail Elementary on June 16th. They celebrated with the traditional 5th grade carnival. Dad cam to volunteer, and Sam enjoyed the free food, dunk tank, and other rides and amusements.

At the end of the carnival, Sam and his classmates paraded around the hallway to bid farewell to their fellow students. Pete rode the bus over from school and snuck in the back door with Dad to join in the fun.

Friday, June 12, 2015

Alto Sax

Sam decided that he wanted to play Alto Sax in Middle School next year. So Dad set off to find a sax that Sam could play over the summer (and not have to rent in the Fall for an exorbitant monthly fee).

There was a nice Vito saxophone for sale in Sterling on Craigslist, similar to this:

So everyone took a drive out to the Eastern part of Sterling to check it out. They walked around back of a house that the sellers were renting, and the lady waited while Sam and Pete tried it out. It came with the case and a few reeds for $300. Sam liked it, so they brought it home.

Sam did not take long to start getting comfortable with his new sax, with some help from Pete.

Tuesday, June 09, 2015

Sweetest Goodbye

This past year Pete completed his freshman year of High School and Sam finished 5th grade. Mom woke Sam up most days and dropped him off at the bus on her way to teaching Math at Sterling Middle School.

This gave Dad and Pete some quality time to spend together going to the allergy shot clinic on Tuesdays and Thursdays ("ENT and Allergy Specialists of VA").

Dad discovered that the music they play in the waiting room is adult easy listening. More specifically: "Maroon 5, Bruno Mars, and occasionally some other stuff".

Dad and Pete worked out a game that if they play either Bruno Mars or Maroon 5 while they are at the office (typically between 5 and 15 minutes), then they would stop at Dunkin' Donuts on the way to school. Not surprisingly, this came to fruition more often than not (although a few times Pete had to be at school so they skipped the donuts anyhow).

Dad also found it amusing that he was always getting slammed by the receptionist. There are many examples, but here is a typical one:

Dad: I don't think we owe anything this time because I paid extra last time and we have a balanceReceptionist: Sorry, I'm looking at the account and you don't have a balanceDad: Hmm, I was pretty sure we had a balanceReceptionist: No, you definitely don't have a balanceDad: OkReceptionist: You do have a credit of $30, though. So you don't have to pay anything.Dad: [Sigh]

Monday, June 08, 2015

Goals

Sam has started to clean out his school items, since there is only one week left in 5th grade. Dad discovered that Sam brought home the paper shown above, in a red folder labeled "Homework". Dad presumed that it has been sitting empty in Sam's folder since early September. Perhaps Sam was not in class on the day that they did the goal setting exercise.

The good news is that one of the blanks is filled out on the sheet (Name). The bad news is that the writing is not Sam's, so someone must have filled that in for him. Which gave Dad an idea...

Dad is not one to leave an empty sheet of goals, so he went ahead and filled out the sheet with a few ideas:

There is still one week left in the querter, so anything is still possible...

Sunday, June 07, 2015

Riven Build Guide

Sam posted his first "publication" today - a Riven Build Guide on MobaFire (wiki). It is a detailed strategy guide for a character in League of Legends.

Below are some excerpts from the guide:

Introduction

Hello everyone! My name is Le monpudding52, and Riven is one of my favorite champions. I've been playing her a lot recently, and I figured I would share my thoughts and ideas with her.This will be a little bit in depth, so just take it a step at a time. It will highlight laning phase, mid-game roaming, teamfighting, and late game.

Pros/Cons

[*]High mobility and damage[*]Can get blown up in fights[*]Has a shield and 2 hard CCs[*]Is vulnerable to targeted poke[*]Has a strong lane phase[*]Is sometimes hard to use in teamights[*]Can save teammates[*]Loses duels vs autoattackers like Udyr

Animation Cancelling

This is the list of basic animation cancels for Riven:E - any QE - WE - R (activate)E - R - any Q (activate)E - R (wind slash)3rd Q - WR (wind slash) - 3rd QIn any of those combos, the abilities will happen at the same time, cancelling the movement of your champion for one of them, but still doing the damage and CC. Props to FragonHD for this video.

Laning Phase

You will have Broken Wings at level 1. When you get into lane and the minions walk down, start going aggressive with Q. Q into them, autoattack. Again. If you don't get the autoattack off, it's ok. Do that for the first two Qs. On the third one, try and hit them and then get about 2-3 autoattacks off, the knockup gives you time. Get Valor second unless you are against a ranged champion. Ki Burst against ranged champions. You have more mobility with E now, so it is easier to close the gap. I often find myself pushed all the way to their tower within the first couple minutes. If that happens, ward the river with trinket, and IF you have teleport, look for opportunities to gank bot lane. Try to bully them as much as you can. If their jungle ganks you, use all your Q charges and E to get out. If you get a chance, try and stun them for extra distance. When stunning them, cancel the animation for it by dashing away at the same time. When you take down their tower or at about 20 minutes, group with your team.

Mid Game and Roaming

During mid-game, Riven is VERY effective at picking off high priority targets. She has a lot of CC to help her lock down carries. If you find someone out of position, pick a fight with them. Remember not to burn your ult on just one person. If the rest of the enemy team fights your team, activate Blade of the Exile. Get in position to stun more than 2 people or knockup more than 2. If you get a successful stun off, activate hydra and your 3 charges of Broken Wings. As their health gets lower, Wind Slash to finish them off or to get them low enough for your ADC to get them all. Besides fights, group with your team and push towers. You have a lot of waveclear so it is easy enough to push up to towers. You also have a lot of AD to take down the towers.

Teamfighting

Like I said before, teamfighting can either be really simple or really hard depending on their team. I already highlighted the individual parts, but this will be more in-depth. When starting fights, YOU are the instigator. Pick fights when you want to, just make sure your team can follow up. Stun them or knock them all up. After you go in, your team can use their CC and AOE to help out. Use all your AOE sources of damage, while trying to weave autoattacks onto their AD carry or mid laner. If you start to get low, try and Q or E out. If you do manage to escape the fight, you can re-engage when your abilities come back up, just make sure you hit your CC so they can't just blow you up. Note you should have Blade of the Exile on during the whole fight. When they get low enough, use Wind Slash to finish them off. Credits to Best Plays on youtube, go check him out.

Late Game

If you play the early and mid game well, you should be kind of fed in the late game. Try and pick teamfights if you can. If you have Youmuu's or Zephyr, splitpushing can be a good idea.If you are splitpushing, use your AOE to clear the waves to push down towers faster. When grouping with your team, it is often easy to get the other team to fight you. It isn't very nice, but you can sometimes bait out angry enemies by spamming an emote like laugh or taunt. If they go for you, just engage onto them. Farm whatever you can, upgrade trinket, get wards down and try and get as big a lead as you can for your team.

Summary

That's all I can think of for now, guys. I will probably be adding more chapters in the future or editing the current ones. Just remember, you can use your own ideas too.If you want to take teleport, go ahead. If you want to build Sorcerer's Shoes, go ahead. This is just what I find works the best and is most reliable/consistent. If you have any suggestions or feedback, go ahead and tell me. Thanks for reading!

Friday, June 05, 2015

Science Project

Pete turned in his science project today on climate change. An ambitious topic for a 9th grade Earth Science class, but it was one that Mr. Lee was willing to accept.

This year in Science has been a bit of a struggle, with Mr. Lee learning the ropes of being a Science teacher (despite having done it now for 15+ years) and Pete having to re-do some of his work at times as projects became properly documented and clarified. In retrospect, he wishes he had taken the "more difficult" Biology class.

Next year Pete is taking another basket of honors classes, so hopefully he is getting more comfortable with doing these projects. Among the other projects Pete has grappled with this year were the articles/timeline for AP History, and the anthology (esesntially an entire book) and "thrice told tales" projects for Honors English.

Dad suggested that Pete have a climate change debate with Tom on our trip in July, but Pete will probably pass on that. Mike was going to rig up the ultra-liberal Thad to be the judge, so there was no way Pete could lose.

Wednesday, June 03, 2015

Final Scenes

Pete took Theatre I this year at Broad Run and they performed "Final Scenes" on June 3rd and 4th. His teacher was Mr. Willmot. Mom and Dad went to watch Pete and Heath Yancey perform ""Cover" by Samuel French. They did a great job.

Pete also got recruited to perform in one of the other plays when one of the students could not participate.

Friday, May 29, 2015

Cocoa Pebbles

The bus routine this year has been better for Dad. Since Mom is teaching at Sterling Middle School, which is a lot closer than Springfield, she can drop Sam off at the bus at 7:32am on her way to work.

So Dad wakes Pete up at 7:45am. Pete wonders why his 12 alarms didn't wake him up, then staggers out of bed after a few minutes. For about the first half of the year, Pete would come downstairs around 8:15 and enjoy a bowl of Cocoa Pebbles before walking to the bus at 8:28. (Or going with Dad on Tuesdays and Thursdays to allergy shots at ENT and/or orthodontist appointments with Dr. D.)

But for the last few months, it has just been Dad sitting at the table with the empty bowl and milk, on the off chance that Pete comes down in time to eat. After Pete heads off to the bus, Dad puts the empty bowl back in the cabinet.

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

Lips or Tongue

It is 10:15pm, so Sam should be brushing his teeth and quickly shuffling off to bed.

However, apparently this is not too late for a game of "lip or tongue". Dad needs to gess whether Sam's upper lip is actually his lip, or in fact his tongue. You would think Dad could guess right at least 50% of the time just by random chance, but Sam is pretty tricky and can fool Dad rather easily in this game.

The reader can rest assured that Sam did eventually go to sleep later that night at some point.

Saturday, May 09, 2015

Spring Family Campout at Camp Snyder

The weekend of the family campout got off to a rough start. Sam went to a sleepover birthday at Colin Nestor's house. This turned out to be one of those parties where the parents just let everyone stay up all night. So Sam was a mess on Saturday morning and wanted to stay home.

Then Pete was disappointed when they arrived at the campsite at Camp Snyder and he realized that there were going to be other families there too. He thought it was a more traditional family campout. And he wasn't happy about not pitching the tent, either.

Anyhow, once they settled in, everyone had some fun doing fishing and archery. Sam went back with Mom to take a nap, while Dad and Pete did a craft and hung out at the dining hall doing crossword puzzles.

The meals were not as good as they were for the Webelos Camp. Lunch was hot dogs and dinner was spaghetti.

At the evening bonfire, the family did a great skit written by Dad, called "The Stick". It was a successful performance, despite their having to go first and Pete accidentally leaving out the "horrible tragedy" line.

They were home by 10am on Sunday morning, leaving plenty of time to relax and recover before school on Monday.

The marigold planters that Pete and Dad made at the craft station actually flourished rather nicely in the kitchen. One of them was decorated as "Happy Mother's Day" and the other was "Eagles Super Bowl 2016".

Friday, May 08, 2015

Selfie Mode

Dad announced at dinner that he had installed a new camera app on his Samsung Galaxy S3 phone which featured a "selfie mode". It figures out when everyone in the picture has their eyes open and is smiling, before taking the picture. So of course everyone took the opportunity to test it out - with Pete at the helm.